


Fake CPR

by BellamyBlakeGriffin



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Actor!Bellamy, Actor!Clarke, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Friends to Lovers, becho break up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-20
Updated: 2019-07-20
Packaged: 2020-07-09 11:08:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19886599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BellamyBlakeGriffin/pseuds/BellamyBlakeGriffin
Summary: Bellamy freaks out about having to touch lips with Clarke on their TV show.Or, Beliza/Bellarke fusion fantasy stemming from speculation on the implications of THAT scene.





	Fake CPR

Bellamy was sitting on his couch, reading the script for the next episode of the TV show he was the lead of when he felt the beginnings of his life changing. 

He was cast in this historical drama seven years ago as the initial antagonist to the daughter of a struggling librarian. This show had changed his life, pushing his acting career to the next level and introducing him to his second family. It hadn’t started well, him and his co-star, Clarke Griffin, had not liked each other. Or, rather, he had not liked her. She was the daughter of very prominent people in the industry and, Bellamy having come from pretty meager beginnings, he had assumed that her getting cast was the product of nepotism, and not her immense acting talents. 

It hadn’t taken long, though, for him to realize that she was one of the most talented up and coming actresses out there and to regret ever being the ass he had been to her. But he was a prideful bastard. So, of course it took a lot longer for him to actually be nice to her, and then for her to actually trust that he wasn’t playing her with his newfound niceness. Once they had actually become friendly with each other, it wasn’t long before they trusted each other implicitly and were the best scene partners each other had ever had. Which was a good thing, as their characters had slowly become allies, and fans were desperate for them to be together romantically.

Their friendship was a natural extension of that and, seven years later, she was the most important person in his life. Although he wouldn’t tell anyone that. Especially not since he was in a relationship. He’d started dating Echo three years ago, when Clarke had her brief, but intense six-month-relationship with her ex, Lexa. She was talking about marriage around the two-month mark and Bellamy had just reacted. He was feeling left behind by his best friend, so when Echo had asked him out at the end of her five-episode ark on the show, he had said yes. 

Of course, at the time, he wouldn’t even admit to himself that his dating Echo was merely a reaction to Clarke and Lexa. And, to be fair, their relationship had evolved and he did love her. But, for the last few months, he had been feeling her slipping away from him and, he thought shamefully, he didn’t really mind. 

Clarke, for her part, had had a couple of relationships since her and Lexa’s dramatic break up, but nothing that serious. In fact, she had just broken up with her latest boyfriend a month before after a year together. 

Echo had moved back to LA full time four months ago for her own career, which Bellamy fully supported, but he had to stay in Vancouver to shoot the show, and long distance was hard. They had less and less time for each other and Bellamy had started to consider flying to LA to have the dreaded conversation with her. The conversation where they both admitted that this wasn’t working. 

He had booked a ticket that afternoon for the next weekend he and Echo had off at the same time, which was a whole month from now, and he was now reading his script, preparing for the first day of shooting on this episode the next day. It was a pretty light episode for him, his character, Arthur, being unaccounted for at the moment. But then he got to the last 10 pages of the script and suddenly, he was everywhere. Saving Elizabeth, Clarke’s character, from her kidnapper, taking her to a secure location and then, the pièce de résistance. 

Elizabeth fell into a frozen lake on the way to the cabin and Arthur had to pull her out, but she wasn’t breathing. So, Arthur had to give her CPR, which he did, along with a desperate rant about how he couldn’t lose her and she had to live. Which she did, thank god. 

Bellamy didn’t think Clarke would’ve kept her character’s death from him, but he had a moment there, where he thought he would have to keep doing this, working, acting, without her. 

Suddenly, while agonizing over almost having to lose Clarke as a co-worker – he was pathetic, he knew – it dawned on him. 

Arthur was going to give Elizabeth CPR.

Bellamy would have to give Clarke CPR. 

Bellamy would have to put his hands on Clarke’s heart and pretend to revive her. 

Bellamy would have to give Clarke his breath. 

Bellamy’s lips would have to touch Clarke’s.

Bellamy had very carefully catered his appearances with fans of the show over the years to make it seem like the idea of Arthur and Elizabeth getting together romantically wasn’t something that he wanted. He had done so knowing all too well that it came from a place of fear. Fear of what he would do if he knew what Clarke’s lips felt like on his.

Bellamy had always been aware that, if she ever gave any indication of feeling more than friendship towards him, he would fall in love with Clarke in seconds. He was already halfway there, had been since he realized how talented and intelligent and kind and caring she was all those years ago. But he had ignored it, not wanting to make things weird between them if she were ever to see through him. 

If he was honest with himself, his relationship with Echo was not a reaction to feeling his best friend slipping away, but a realization that he had to move on if he wanted to preserve his sanity when faced with Clarke in serious, potentially forever relationships. And by the time she and Lexa broke up, he really had fallen for Echo and was getting serious about her. And he had been completely faithful to Echo for the entire duration of their relationship, both emotionally and physically. Until now, apparently.

But now, with his relationship on the brink of death and the prospect of finally knowing what Clarke’s lips felt like on his, even if it wasn’t a real kiss, he couldn’t ignore it anymore. He was in love with his best friend and he couldn’t keep it buried anymore. 

***

A week and a half after that faithful night, Bellamy finally was scheduled to come in to film his scenes for this episode. He had spent the past week and a half compulsively preparing for his directorial debut, which was the episode right after this one. He knew him and Clarke had pretty emotional conversations in his episode, but that wasn’t anything new. 

What was new, though, was them having to touch lips the next day. 

He walked into hair and make-up that morning and Clarke was already in her chair, earbuds in and eyes closed. She had to get hair extensions put in everyday, so she could spend up to four hours in hair and make-up in the morning. He knew she liked to listen to white noise and have a nap while the hair-dresser worked on her, because she had to come in early and one thing Clarke would never be was a morning person. He didn’t want to disturb her, even if she had probably been sleeping for two hours now, so he sat down quietly and smiled at the make-up artist who was meant to start working on him. 

He sat there relaxing and being made-up for about fifteen minutes before he felt Clarke stirring up next to him. He reached and pulled her earbud out of her ear,

“Morning, Sunshine,” he said, smiling. “Have a good nap?”

“Yes,” she said, yawning, “in fact, I had the best nap in the entire world!” She threw him a giant, exaggerated smile, “Hi. I haven’t seen you in forever! I hate it when they decide that you’re not to be in an episode,” she said, overly dramatic.

“Yes,” Bellamy said, sarcastic, “how dare they give me a week off filming to prepare for directing my first episode starting next week! I can’t believe they would want me to do well at something I have wanted to try since season two of this show.”

“I know, I know. I’m an asshole, I just miss you, is all. And I know you’ll be gone for a long weekend after your episode to see Echo, and that you’ll be super busy for the next two weeks being a big shot director. So, it’s kind of cruel to expect me to spend a whole month practically not seeing you at all!”

Bellamy put his hand on her shoulder, his heart squeezing in his chest and forcing a teasing tone into his voice, “Onh, you’re going to miss me? I am flattered.” 

They fell into a comfortable silence and Bellamy caught Harper, the hairdresser who was now working on his hair, throwing a knowing look to Monroe, the make-up artist working on Clarke. Bellamy knew what people said about him and Clarke when they weren’t around. He knew that they all thought the two of them were secretly dating, but Bellamy chose to ignore it, and, thankfully, so did Clarke. He knew that if she ever brought it up, he would be unable to contain his newly admitted feelings for her. 

They were out of hair and make-up 20 minutes later and headed to set for the scene where Bellamy would be saving Clarke from evil Russel and his gooneys. 

They got through the day easily, as they always did when they had scenes together, and, when they wrapped, Clarke asked him if he wanted to come over to her place to watch some trashy TV show she was hooked on at the moment.

“I really shouldn’t, I have so much to do for next week, I need to keep working tonight,” Bellamy said, looking at her sadly. He really wasn’t enjoying having to turn down time with Clarke, but he was telling the truth, he really wanted to do well at this directing thing, so he was putting in as much work as he could into it.

“Oh, ok,” she said, adverting her eyes from his, clearly sad, “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then,” she turned to walk to her trailer and Bellamy almost stopped her and changed his mind about hanging out with her. However, he had to work, so he let her go. He knew he would be feeling bad about this all night, though. 

He spent his evening pouring over the script for his episode and getting things done in preparation for the next week, but when it was time to go to sleep, he found himself unable to sleep. He couldn’t get the stupid CPR out of his mind, or Clarke’s face when he turned her down earlier. 

At about 3 am, Bellamy finally fell asleep, dreaming of himself with Clarke, on her couch, watching trash TV and cuddling.

***

Bellamy didn’t see Clarke in hair and make-up or wardrobe that morning, so the first time he saw her, she was preparing to go into a fake lake for him to pull him out of. 

She went in and they filmed the part where he rescued her from drowning. They were doing this scene in two parts because, well, logistics. So, they spent the morning with Clarke going in and out of the water, then they broke for lunch. Bellamy had to go and deal with a last-minute location problem for his episode, so he didn’t eat with Clarke, unlike every other day they had spent onset together since they had become friends. She shot him a knowing smile when he was walking away, so he knew she understood. He still missed their daily ritual, though. 

So, he spent his lunch break in a frenzy and his CPR scene wasn’t at the forefront of his mind for an hour. But then, it was time to get back to set, where Bellamy had to have a mental break down and kiss Clarke. Well, not him. And not Clarke. Arthur and Elizabeth. And not kiss, more like breathe for her. He kept reminding himself of these distinctions, just to keep what little sanity he had left. 

When he walked in, Clarke was already there, sitting on the ground where she would be when he revived her. 

They set up the scene and did a practice run with all the change ups they had to do with the dummy they had for when he was hitting her chest. They weren’t going in for the breath exchange for this, which Bellamy was a bit worried about. He thought maybe if he had a round of practice before the cameras started rolling, he wouldn’t be completely useless on actual camera. 

But, of course, that’s exactly what happened. 

The moment his lips touched Clarke’s for the first time, Bellamy went into a sort of haze. He couldn’t remember what his next line was, he wasn’t even Arthur anymore. He rarely ever broke character, after seven years of being this man almost every day, but he did so now. He just stared at her, for what felt like forever and no time at all at the same time. 

He stared for so long that Clarke opened her eyes to throw him a questioning look. 

“Bell?” She said, “You okay?”

He opened his mouth to say something, anything, but nothing came out. And then the director was calling out to him, and all he could do was get a grip on his emotions, apologize and start again. Which he did. And he managed to get through the scene and pour all of his emotions associated to Clarke into Arthur. 

When they were done, Bellamy practically ran off set and to his trailer, closing and locking the door behind him.

He needed a moment. He had just spent hours upon hours shooting that scene and giving Clarke CPR and he needed to have a breather. All he could think about was the feel of her lips on his. 

He was so in love with her, just giving her fake CPR was wrecking him. He had to tell her, otherwise he didn’t think their friendship could survive him being like this. But he couldn’t. Not while he was still with Echo.

So, Bellamy could only see one other option. Avoid Clarke outside of work until he could see Echo and tell her that he couldn’t be with her anymore. 

With his new resolve, Bellamy changed out of his wardrobe and packed up his stuff with the intention of going home and crashing. He walked to his door and opened it, only to find Clarke standing on the other side, in her own clothes, hand up, as if she was about to knock. 

“Hey,” she said, “care to tell me what that was about earlier?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Bellamy replied, not looking at her. Trying to push passed her, he continued, “Listen, I’d love to chat but I really need to go home and work a little bit before crashing.”

“No, no, no.” Clarke said, stopping him from leaving, “I want to know what’s going on. We have never had a moment like that when working together. Ever. It was like we’d never shared a scene. And then you just ran out,” she sounded so confused, and in pain, “Did I do something to make you uncomfortable?” Bellamy understood right away.

“No, god, no!” Bellamy exclaimed as he pulled her into his trailer. He couldn’t do anything about his feelings, but he had to say something to reassure Clarke. Once they were inside, he turned to look into her eyes and tried to infuse as much sincerity into his eyes as he could, “You didn’t do anything wrong, Clarke. I…, I can’t really explain myself here, at least not right now, but I swear this was not your fault.”

“What is it that you can’t tell me about, Bell?” Clarke asked, even more confused than before, “I am your best friend, if you can’t tell me about it, who are you going to talk to?”

“I will tell you about it Clarke, as soon as I can, but I need to do something first, and this is non-negotiable. Trust me, when I do tell you, you’ll be glad that I waited,” Bellamy said, looking her in the eye. Clarke looked more frustrated than ever,

“Bell, whatever it is, if it’s affecting our work together, I should know!”

“I can’t tell you, Clarke! For you, for me, and for Echo, I can’t tell you!” Bellamy exploded, saying more than he ever meant to before having spoken to Echo, “Look,” he started again, calmer now, “I will tell you everything when I can, trust me. I probably want to tell you more than you could ever want to know. And I swear it will not affect our work. Today was… it was something out of the ordinary and I swear it will never happen again.”

“I don’t understand this, Bellamy,” Clarke said, “But, I trust you, I guess, so I’ll stop asking you about it until you’re ready to talk,” she still looked hurt and confused, but Bellamy couldn’t not be relieved that she was letting this go, “Have a good weekend, Bell, I’ll see you next week.”

She turned around and left before he could say anything more. He thought he saw a tear on her cheek when she was turning away and he was feeling awful for hurting her, even if he knew it was necessary. But it gave him a tiny bit of hope. She wouldn’t be this upset if she really only saw him as a friend, right?

***

Bellamy had just wrapped the filming of his episode and he was on his way to the airport to fly to LA to break up with his girlfriend. 

He had spent the past two weeks working day and night to make sure his episode was the best he could make it. He was exhausted, but his hard work had payed off, he was extremely proud of everyone of his friends who had performed in the episode and he thought that he was going to be able to pull something amazing out of it. 

It had also given him the best excuse to avoid Clarke outside of work for those two weeks, which had been a good thing, because every time he saw her he felt himself less and less capable of keeping himself from shouting his feelings at her. Thankfully, she had known that he would be busy, so she didn’t seem to be too suspicious of his avoiding her.

Now he was finally on his way to divest himself of his last remaining ties to his girlfriend, they hadn’t even spoken, aside from him texting her his arrival time, for weeks now. It really wasn’t a relationship anymore, he just had to make it official, to leave it with a clear conscience and to respect himself, Clarke and Echo. 

He flew on the plane and got off at LAX. When he got to baggage claim, Echo was there, waiting for him. 

He did not see that coming.

“Hey,” he said, confused, “I thought we were meeting at your apartment.” Bellamy moved towards her, going in for a hug.

“Hi, yeah, I just thought I would surprise you. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea though,” she told him, with a small smile.

“No, no, it was. I haven’t seen you in forever,” Bellamy said, with a genuine smile, “Come on, let’s go.”

They walked to Echo’s car and drove to her apartment, catching up on the last month of each other’s lives. Bellamy may not be in love with Echo anymore, but she would always have a place in his heart. She had been a big part of his life for a long time and he had loved her. He just couldn’t lie to himself anymore.

When they walked into her apartment, Bellamy braced himself for this conversation. He knew he had to tell her tonight, he didn’t want their last weekend together to forever be shaded in a cloud of lies. 

They sat in her living room and Bellamy took a deep breath, “Echo, I have to say something. I think that we’ve both seen this coming, but I’m sorry if I’m wrong on your part,” he looked at her, trying to see if he was indeed taking her by surprise, “I think we both know that this, us, has been over for quite a while, but I came here so that we could make it official.”

“You’re right, this is not working anymore. Lingering in something that doesn’t feel right isn’t fair to either of us. And I wanted to talk to you about something. I’ve met someone,” she said carefully, “don’t worry, nothing’s happened, I wanted to have this conversation before anything happened with her.”

“That’s good, actually, because I wanted to talk to you about something similar,” he took a deep breath, “I am in love with Clarke.”

“I know,” Echo said, a small smile on her lips, “You’ve always cared about her, I always knew that If you just let yourself feel it, you would be in love with her. You guys are going to be amazing together, I just know it,” she smiled and squeezed his hand.

“Well, she has to feel the same way before we can be together, and I don’t know how likely that is,” Bellamy said, looking down at his lap.

“Oh, trust me, that girl is crazy about you, I’ve always known it,” Echo said, her smile growing. Bellamy looked up at her and smiled through his insecurities,

“Ok, tell me about this girl, then.”

***

They talked all night. Bellamy had almost forgotten about how well he and Echo got along, and he thought that, without the pressure of maintaining a relationship that wasn’t working, they could be pretty amazing friends.

They spent the next day out on the town, shopping and visiting, Bellamy hadn’t been to LA in months, he kind of missed it, if he was honest.

In the afternoon, they were walking on a street full of shops when something in a shop window caught his eye. It was a jeweler and they had a beautiful ring on display, simple and golden with a blue stone, it immediately reminded him of Clarke. 

“You should get it, Bellamy,” Echo said, a knowing smile on her face.

“What? No!” Bellamy exclaimed, “I couldn’t possibly buy an engagement ring for a woman whom I don’t even know the feelings of! What am I going to do, get down on one knee and ask her to marry me the second I see her? No, no, I’m just being stupid.”

“Bellamy,” Echo said, softly, “Clarke loves you, I know it. And even if you have the ring, it doesn’t mean you have to propose right away. But this is her ring, I saw it in your eyes the second you set your eyes on it. I think you would regret it more if you don’t buy it.”

So, on Sunday, Bellamy was on his way to the airport with a new engagement ring in Clarke’s size – he really shouldn’t be surprised that he knew what size ring she wore – in his work bag. Echo let him get to the airport on his own, having a date with Jade, the girl she was going to start seeing. 

When he got home in Vancouver, he took the ring and placed it carefully in his bedside drawer. He didn’t have to make that much of an effort to hide it, Clarke not living with him and everything. 

As soon as he was done unpacking he texted Clarke asking her to come over. She answered a couple of minutes later, telling him she would be on her way in 10 minutes. She would need about 20 minutes to get to his place, so he had half an hour to kill and if he didn’t find something productive to do, he would just eat his nails while he waited. So, he started cleaning the kitchen.

He was just finishing vacuuming the floor in his bedroom when he heard her key in the door. 

“Hey, Bell?” Clarke called from the door.

“In here!” He shouted.

“Hey, did you have a good weekend with Echo?” she asked.

Bellamy smiled, “Yeah, it was actually pretty amazing,” he said, turning to look at her. Her face was distorted, as if she’d just been punched in the stomach.

“Good.”

“We really needed the time, I think. I had a lot to talk to her about and I was worried of how she would react, but it ended up being super positive,” Bellamy could barely keep the smile off his face at the look of jealousy on Clarke’s face.

“That sounds great Bell,” she said, “but I don’t really want to hear about the amazing time you had with your girlfriend, so, I’ll just go, I think.”

“Ex-girlfriend,” Bellamy said, smirking.

“Wh-, what?”

“The thing I wanted to talk to Echo about. I broke up with her or, we broke up with each other I guess? She met someone and we haven’t been talking, this was a long time coming.”

“She met someone? She didn’t… you know… did she?” Clarke asked, suddenly standing like a warrior, ready to defend his honor.

“No, she didn’t cheat, Clarke. Not physically, at least. But I can’t be mad at her for the emotional stuff, because I’ve also fallen for someone else,” Bellamy smiled at her. She was looking at him with a confused stare.

“You didn’t tell me that.”

“No, I didn’t. I couldn’t,” Bellamy said, putting emphasis on the last word, reminding Clarke of their conversation from weeks ago. 

“Wait, this is what was going on? You have feelings for someone who isn’t Echo and that’s why you were so weird that day? How does that make any sort of sense?” Clarke asked, getting frustrated.

“Because the person I have feelings for is you Clarke!” Bellamy exclaimed, “I love you and that day was the first time I ever got to feel your lips on mine and I was overwhelmed with the feeling of it. I couldn’t believe I had waited so long to feel it and I couldn’t believe that it wasn’t really me, feeling you, but our characters, and they weren’t even kissing. I couldn’t tell you any of this, because I wanted to officially end things with Echo before anything could happen with us, otherwise I would have disrespected the both of you, and that’s not me. I needed to have this conversation with you with a clear conscience. Because, Clarke, I am in love with you, probably have been for seven years and whenever I shared that with you, I needed it to be clean, because you are my forever. You are the person I want by my side for the rest of my life.”

While saying all this, Bellamy had walked towards her and was now holding her face, his hands practically engulfing her whole head with their size difference.

“Bell,” Clarke said, with tears in her eyes, “You have to be serious, you have to mean this. I can’t do this with you if you aren’t a hundred percent sure that I am what you want forever. Because you are my forever, no question. So, if you need time, time to deal with your break up, I’ll give that to you. I have been waiting for you for years Bell, I can keep waiting a little while longer.” 

Bellamy couldn’t believe his ears. She really thought that he needed time? He didn’t. But he knew that, whatever he said, she would insist that it was too soon for him, because she was so pragmatic. But this was a matter of the heart, and there was nothing pragmatic about those, so he knew he needed to show her with his actions that he was ready for their forever together to start now. He let go of her face, but not before wiping her tears away, “Stay right there,” he said with a smile.

He turned to his bed and walked to the bedside table, pulling her ring out of the drawer. He took a deep breath and turned back towards her. He saw the exact moment when she noticed what he had in his hand, her eyes going wide. 

“I saw this yesterday while I was out on a walk with Echo, and immediately thought of you. I wasn’t going to buy it, not wanting to get my hopes up about your reaction to this conversation, but Echo reminded me that I would only regret passing a chance like this one. So, I bought it, thinking I would be keeping it for a little while at least, until you were ready. But I think you are, ready, just like I am,” he walked over to her and got down to his knee, opening the box for her.

“I have loved you since I met you Clarke, it just took me a while to figure it out. But now that I have, it’s all that I can see. I think about you before I fall asleep, you’re in my dreams, you’re the first thing on my mind when I wake up and I don’t stop thinking about you all day. You are my best friend and, I know now, my soulmate, the love of my life. I don’t want to wait anymore. I want to start the rest of our life together now. So, Clarke Griffin, will you marry me?” Bellamy was still looking up at her, all of the sincerity and love in the world in his eyes. She was crying and smiling down at him.

“Of course, I want to marry you, Bell. I have been in love with you for so long, I don’t know any different anymore,” she pulled him to his feet and kissed him slowly, and then not so slow. And then they were lying on his bed, him on top of her, getting carried away. 

But before they could get too far, Bellamy reluctantly pulled himself from her sweet lips – god, he thought giving her fake CPR was something, he was wrong – he smiled at her indignant expression, like she couldn’t believe he was keeping her from kissing him. Frankly, he can’t say he disagreed. But he had to do this one thing first.

“You haven’t put on your ring, Love,” he said, grabbing the ring from the box still in his right hand, “I love you, I can’t wait to marry you and spend the rest of my life with you.”

He grabbed her left hand and slipped the ring on her finger, dropping a kiss to it after he was done. He looked back up at her and couldn’t help himself from kissing her again, getting lost in it, but not before thinking back to that faithful night, sitting on his couch, “And to say that all of this started because of fake CPR…”

“What?” Clarke asked, confused. But before he could explain, his mouth found hers again and there really wasn’t much space for talking after that. He would explain his ridiculousness later.


End file.
